Zaporozhets, A. V., & Markova, T. A. (1980/1983).

Principles
of preschool pedagogy, Part I, Chapter III: The psychological
foundations of preschool education. Soviet Education, 25(3),
7 l-90. [Translated from Russian text, 1980, Osnovy doshkolnoi
pedagogiki. Moscow: Pedagogkia Publishers.]

CHAPTER III. THE PSYCHOLOGICAL FOUNDATIONS

OF PRESCHOOL EDUCATION

In elaborating the scientific basis of preschool education, researchers have been guided by the overall objectives of communist education, proceeding, first and foremost, from the specific features of the early stages in the physical and mental development of the child.
Children differ from adults by virtue of the incompleteness
of their bodily structure, the immaturity of many of its functions, and the limited nature of their physical and mental powers
and abilities. The child must travel a long path of development
in order to make the transition from a helpless being requiring
constant care to an intelligent member of society. This development includes the physical growth and maturation of the body
and the formation of mental properties and abilities through the
assimilation of social experience, which, at any stage, depends
upon the kind of experience that is assimilated and the specific
nature of such assimilation.
The social experience that is fixed in the material and nonmaterial culture of mankind has a great many different facets;
only a small part is purposefully and systematically transmitted
to the child in the form of organized teaching. In all stages of
development, the child receives experience spontaneously,
through various forms of contact with the people around him,
in everyday life and in various activities. The younger the
child, the greater the proportion of spontaneous learning about
71

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mankinds accumulated social experience and the more difficult it is to evaluate the role that spontaneous forms of learning play in the formation of mental properties and abilities.
Not by chance have the early stages of childhood served as
the basis for the proposal of numerous naturalistic conceptions,
which have ascribed the decisive role in the mental development of the child to the maturation of the nervous system or to
adaptation to the natural and social environment and which have
viewed age-related psychological characteristics as the eternal traits of childhood that are independent of living conditions
and upbringing.
A substantial blow has been dealt to such concepts by the research that has been conducted in recent decades by Soviet and
progressive foreign scholars who have brought to light significant resources for early childhood and preschool development.
This research has shown that, when conditions of upbringing
change, children can learn knowledge and skills, and forms of
cognitive activity can be formed in them that were previously
considered beyond their reach.
However, in itself, recognition of the decisive influence of
living conditions and upbringing and of the influence of the assimilation of social experience on mental development in early
childhood and the preschool years does not answer the question
of the specific properties of age and its significance for subsequent stages of development. Analysis of the conditions of child
development and the factors engendering those conditions will
help us understand this fact.
;
The conditions underlying the mental development of the
1
young and preschool-age child differ from the conditions that
1
influence the development of children in other age groups be1
cause of the childs position in the system of social relationships and the nature of the childs contacts with the surrounding
world and those types of activity in which he realizes his attitude toward the world.
From birth until the time the child enters school, there are
no serious social responsibilities. This is the time of the childs
greatest dependence upon adults. The sphere of the childs con- ;

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tacts is limited to close friends and relatives and, later on, to

his peer group. These contacts are primarily personal and intimate, based on emotional contact. Adults satisfy a childs
needs, irrespective of his behavior and performance.
The childs activity in which social experience is assimilated
is not directed specifically toward that assimilation; it is a byproduct.
It would seem that all the conditions indicated are extremely
diffuse, that they do not regulate the course of child development, and that they permit (if only because of the absence of a
unified system of fixed demands) innumerable individual variations. But it is in the early stages that mental development is
indeed most intensive and, most importantly, uniform: the natural replacement of one stage by another is seen most clearly
at this time. Consequently, existing conditions quite unequivocally determine the basic line of mental development, Early
and preschool childhood is a concrete historical phenomenon
that is tied directly to the level of the development of societys
economic production. Ethnographic and historical evidence
shows that in a primitive culture children participate in labor
activity literally from the time they take their first steps, occupying an appropriate place in the societal division of labor.
Childhood, as we know it, came into being when children were
excluded from adult labor, when labor began to require a high
level of preparation and the qualities that are needed by a participant in contemporary economic production.
Thus, the place of the young and preschool-age child in the
system of societal relationships and his characteristic types
of activity and interrelationship with the surrounding world
originated at a certain stage of social development under the
influence of a spontaneously extant but objectively necessary
system of demands associated with his preparation for partici pation in the life of modern society, in economic production.
. A detailed analysis of the developmental significance of the
forms of childrens contacts and activity and the educational
potential contained in these age stages will promote a true understanding of the tasks of education in early and preschool childhood.

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1. Infancy

The human child is considerably more helpless at birth than

the young of animals. Assuming careful nurturing, the inborn
unconditional reflex mechanisms of the child secure only survival and the operation of the basic [physiological] systems
(respiratory, circulatory, temperature-regulating, and digestive), but not the development and improvement of the characteristically human forms of behavior. The following fact is
highly illustrative from this point of view. The childs atavistic reflexes of clutching and pushing with the legs, which
many researchers have regarded as basic for learning to reach
and crawl, are not such in reality. As shown by the data of Soviet researchers, these reflexes and the corresponding actions
possess a different afferentiation and motor structure; what is
more, some of them die out entirely by the time the others are
beginning to form.
A newly born child is in continuous contact with adults from
the very beginning. If his inborn organic requirements are sufficiently satisfied, they soon lose their central significance and
give way to new requirements - for the impressions, exercise, and contact with adults that are the basis for mental development. Even though the need for communication arises in
a contact situation that is directed toward the satisfaction of
biological requirements, it is not a derivative but, subsequently,
forms anew as a primary social requirement.
This first type of leading activity - contact with adults - develops along with the formation of new requirements. Initially,
it is of a directly emotional character. By the second month of
a childs life, an adults smile and words evoke positive responses: the child calms down and concentrates his attention
on the adult; after some time, he smiles and coos and becomes
more energetic in his motor activity. By the age of two months,
the child has formed a characteristic, complex reaction, which
includes all the components enumerated and is known as the
animation complex [kompleks ozhivleniia]. The animation complex forms as reactive education and soon becomes activity that

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is intended to arouse the attention of adults and to maintain contact with them.
In the second half-year of the childs life, there is a marked
change in his social relationships. Direct emotional contact
between an adult and the child begins to give way to contact
based on other objects, in particular, toys. Initially, the child
is prone to focus his attention only on objects that are shown
to him by a grownup. The adult gradually leads the child into
the world of objects and forms the childs attitude toward this
world. Such contact takes the form of joint activity in the course
of which the adult demonstrates to the child elementary actions
and helps the child perform them. Joint activity is the major
way in which the child is influenced in his first year of life.
It is difficult to exaggerate the importance that social contacts hold for the childs mental development. Both Soviet and
foreign literature contain abundant evidence of the consequences
of so-called hospitalism [gospitalizm], when a child is reared
with deficient social contact. Although the child may be well
cared for, there is a lag in the development of motor skills and
speech; such children become sluggish and indifferent to their
surroundings.
In the process of social contact, an adult satisfies not only
the childs developing need for such contact but all the childs
other needs - in particular, the need for new impressions and
for motor activity. Social contact is the basic source of various kinds of impressions (visual, auditory, tactile) and, more
important, is the organizational factor underlying these impressions. With the help of adults, the child learns how to hold his
head up, crawl, sit down, and, finally, stand up and take his first
steps. In the third or fourth month of his life, he tries to grasp
objects and gradually develops an understanding of distance and
of the position of an object in space and its shape and size. The
child is instilled with perceptual models that direct and regulate grasping motions and, later, the simplest manipulation of
objects. Adult actions become an object of imitation that begins to take shape in the first months of the childs life. Imitation plays a special part in mental development. The child

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proceeds from external forms of imitation to internal forms,

which become the basis of the childs understanding of the actions associated with objects and subsequently of the objects
themselves. Through social contact, the child is also prepared
to master speech. His hearing of speech sounds develops, and
his voice reacts. The child coos, babbles, and finally utters his
first words.
Social contact is the childs leading activity for a relatively
short time. Even in infancy, quite complex manipulations with
objects are performed; the child can be taught to perform certain actions demonstrated by grownups and can transfer the use
of an assimilated action to a new object. But manipulation is
directed only toward use of the external properties of objects.
The transition from infancy to early childhood is associated
with the development of a new attitude toward the world of objects: the child begins to view them not merely as objects suitable for manipulation but as things that have a definite purpose
and a concrete mode of use - a function that is assigned to them
in his social experience. The child redirects his interest to
the mastery of more and more new actions with objects. Activity involving objects becomes the leading form of activity
throughout early childhood.
2. Early Childhood
The specific features of object-related activity, compared witb
manipulation, are determined by the fact that the function of
things is not an external property and cannot be elicited through
attempts to apply the actions that the child is able to perform.
Function is mastered only in the course of purposeful or spontaneous learning.
Mastery of the world of objects in early childhood is directly
associated with the formation of specifically human abilities.
Although the childs perception of objects begins to take shape
in infancy, that perception remains extremely limited, directed
toward the identification of those properties of an object that
appeal to the child and that conform to the childs extant motor

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skills. When children carry out actions with objects, for the
first time, they must take into account the properties of objects
in relationship to other objects - their objective qualities, This
is evident when the child begins to master related actions in
which he brings two or more objects (or parts) into definite
spatial relationships with one another - for example, closing
boxes with lids, fitting figures of certain shapes into appropriate slots, and putting together and taking apart pyramids,
Matreshka dolls, or other play objects. Initially, with an adults
assistance, the child masters ways of comparing objects and of
selecting necessary combinations with the application of external techniques (attaching, stacking, etc.). External means are
the basis on which the child forms his perceptions that give an
initial orientation in the performance of object-related actions.
The child then proceeds to make visual comparisons of properties, and, in the childs eyes, these properties become the
permanent features of objects, upon which the possibility and
mode of performance of various practical actions depend. The
child begins to accumulate ideas intensively, ideas that comprise a foundation for the subsequent development of figurative
forms of cognition.
Folk pedagogy has wisely taken into account the part that is
played by the mastery of comparative actions in the childs
mental development. A significant percentage of the toys dating back to a time when research knowledge about the objectrelated activity of children was totally nonexistent allowed the
child to perform comparative actions.
In addition to developing his perception in the process of
mastering object-related activities, the child also develops the
basic components of reasoned thought. In object-related activity, for the first time, the relationship between objects and
the possibility of using one object to influence another are apprehended. The childs mastery of the simplest implements a spoon, pencil, dustpan, etc. - with adult assistance is of particular importance here. Such action is indirect. It requires
a basic restructuring of the childs movements and adaptation
to the logic of the implement, as well as the establishment of

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the implement-object relationship, as a result of which the

goal of the action is attained. Starting with assimilation of the
actual types of such connections, which are conveyed to the
child by adults, the child subsequently reproduces them under
new conditions in the process of resolving new problems.
In the development of the childs reasoning, as well as in the
development of perception, the resolution of problems through
an external probing of objects, involving visual and operational
thought, is replaced by the resolution of problems on an internal
plane with the aid of images - visual and figurative thought.
The development of figurative forms of thought is based on the
development of primary generalizations. The child does not,
by any means, assimilate the general meaning of the words that
he learns to understand and use from grownups all at once. Initially, the child develops the ability to generalize about objects
operationally - through action; subsequently, this ability is reinforced in words. These first generalizations have a functional
nature, and the object-implements are their carriers. After
the child has mastered a concrete mode of action, with the aid
of an implement, the child begins to use it in different situations
and masters its general meaning for resolving a certain type of
problem.
One important aspect in developing the childs object-related
activity is the change in the connection between the action and
the object. In the manipulation stage, the action is indifferent
to the object. The child can perform the manipulations he knows
with any object. In the process of mastering the function of objects, a strict one-to-one relationship is established between
the action and the object: the object can be used only for its
specific purpose. Finally, the child returns to a free use of the
object at a new level: the child is familiar with the basic function of the object. Thus, action acquires a relative independence. One basic achievement of early childhood is the inception of the signal (symbolic) function of consciousness. When a
child begins to perform an action without an object, or with an
object that does not correspond to that action, the action loses
its practical meaning and becomes the representation or de-

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piction of real action. If a child drinks from a block, this is

not drinking but the representation of drinking. The designation
of an action is followed by the designation of the object and by
the replacement of one by the other. The block is thus used
as a cup. But in early childhood, the child is unaware of the
replacement and does not assign to the substitute object the
name of the object replaced. Such consciousness is not a prerequisite of, but the result of, performing actions with substitute objects. This consciousness attests to the transition to a
new, typically human type of knowledge about reality, knowledge
that is mediated through signal systems and that promotes the
development of new types of activity: role play and productive
activity (drawing, design, etc.).
However, inception of the signal (or symbolic) function of
consciousness only prepares the operational-technical side of
new types of activity, and a [new] level of mental activity is required to make the transition to them. They are mastered under the influence of changes in the personality-motivational
sphere.
In early childhood, the child is fused with a situation, with
other people. The child does not distinguish himself from his
own actions and from the conditions in which they are carried
out. In the third year of life, he separates himself from others.
He becomes aware of himself as the constant source of wishes
and actions: he has his first encounter with self-awareness.
A substantial part in the development of self-awareness is played
by an awareness of the desires that emerge as the childs own
wishes and may or may not coincide with the demands of adults,
the formation of a plan of ideas and motivations for action that
are directed toward imagined rather than real objects, and the
growth of practical independence and the capability of performing various actions unassisted by adults.
The inception of self-awareness causes the childs attitude
toward adults to change. For the first time, he wants to behave
like a grownup, to fulfill an adult role, to have a grownups mastery over things and events. The fact that the child has increased possibilities brings him into conflict with previously

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existing forms of contact and activity. This contradiction is

called the three- year- [old] crisis, a crisis that basically means
the childs demanding independence and placing his desires before those of grownups. However, the awareness of greater potential does not correspond to actual potential; the children are
not placed on a par with grownups, able to perform grownup
activity. Therefore, role play, in which the child plays at adult
activities and interactions, helps resolve the crisis and satisfy
the childs need for a new type of participation in adult life
(participation on an equal footing with adults). Role play, to
which the child turns at the end of early childhood, becomes
the leading type of his activity. In role play, the childs basic
needs and interests are expressed, new personality traits are
developed and mental qualities improved, and new types of
child activity are born.
3. Preschool Age
A unique feature of role play is its figurative, symbolic nature. Children assume certain roles (usually adult roles), as
if they were someone else; they perform play actions that imitate the people they are portraying and, to one degree or another, use substitute objects that frequently have little similarity to the corresponding objects in the adult world, but make
it possible to perform play activity. Play activities are emotionally saturated, appeal to the child, and have deep personal
meaning. Childs play is social in its origin, content, and strut
ture (unlike the games of young animals).
Role play dilferentiates between the subject matter - that
area of reality which is depicted in play - and the content the activities and personal interrelationships that are singled
out in this area of reality. Both the subject and the content of
childrens games change substantially throughout preschool
childhood. Family life, the labor activity of growups, and important events are the subjects of games. The variety of subjects depends on the breadth of the sphere of activity with which
the children are acquainted. Three- and four-year-old children

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take the subjects of their games from their immediate environment (family or kindergarten). Five- and six-year-old children reflect all kinds of adult activity in their games (mail delivery, railroads, stores, space travel, school, etc.). But, even
within one area of subject matter, children of different ages
single out various content. They proceed from the portrayal
of individual actions involving objects to more and more complex interrelationships between people. The depiction of individual actions loses its significance and acquires a stable nature; realization of the rights and obligations corresponding to
each role becomes paramount: acting out a doctors attitude
toward a patient, a teachers attitude toward a pupil, etc. In
addition to a portrayal of the external social hierarchy, the
children also depict the morally determined interrelationships
of people in their games.
Along with changes in the content of play, the structure of
play - which is determined by the aggregate of roles that the
participants in the games have assumed - develops and becomes more complex. The children proceed from a small number of roles and a single-valued subordinate relationship (mother-daughter) to games in which several roles may be of a complex, subordinated nature (physician, nurse, parents, sick children, other children).
Play is the first and basic type of the joint activity of preschoolers. The need to depict joint adult actions and their interrelationships requires that several roles be incorporated in
a game, unifying several participants in play and their interaction. This gives rise to two types of interrelationship in
games : role-play relationships, corresponding to the content
of a game, and real relationships in which the children act as
partners carrying out a common task. The real relationships
are carried out outside a game, incidental to it (before play
starts and during the breaks that result from the need to coordinate future activities), or in the course of a game, intertwined with the interrelationships within the game. Forming
the group of players, choosing the subject and content of the
game, the assignment of roles, and the distribution of the mate-

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rial to be used, discussion of the rules of behavior required

in a given role, etc., may be the subject of real relationships.
The developmental significance of play activity is multifaceted. What is more, each individual facet, and all of them
combined, contribute to the formation of the childs psyche.
In its expanded form, role play is a model of the adult social
relationships that interest children and become the object of
their activities. Therefore, play is also a means of orienting
their thinking in such relationships.
At the same time, the figurative and symbolic nature of the
depiction of adult activities and relationships in games leads
to the development of figurative thought and imagination. The
child at play gives the substitute object a name and treats it ac.
cordingly. When he plays with one object, he depicts an action
with another, which promotes improvement of the signal function of consciousness and the formation of conceptual thought.
In the course of development of the game, the reproduction of
familiar actions and situations gives way to the creation of new
situations, and elements of creative imagination enter the child
activity. Initially, imaginative play is continuously connected
with the activity itself; such imaginative activity on the part of
the child is internalized by the end of the preschool age period.
The play of older preschoolers is frequently internalized. Theg
imagine a situation and actions within the situation, but do not
perform them in actuality.
The actual relationships that form in the course of play are
a true school for social contact with ones peers: the children
learn how to coordinate their opinions and behavior and to acquire the skills of mutual understanding and help. The initiators
and organizers of games develop organizational abilities. The
formation of the childs internal world and the formation of his
personality - a process that began in connection with the mastery of object-related activity - continue in play. The most
significant aspect of this process is the volitional regulation of
behavior and the shared subordination of motives. The young
childs behavior is impulsive, primarily influenced by emotions and wishes. The childs separation of the self from others

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on the threshold of preschool childhood is limited to an awareness of the very fact of his existence, which does not lead
automatically to an integration of the childs consciousness and
behavior and is only the prerequisite to this integration.
When a child interacts with other children in real and imagined situations, he is compelled to subordinate his actions to
particular demands that stem from the overall sense of the
game being played and to regulate his behavior in conformity
with his role and the role of others and with the games rules.
At the end of the preschool age period, children typically attach more and more significance to observing the rules of a
game. They also make the transition from hidden rules, dictated by role interrelationships, to open rules that directly regulate the course of a game. Following the rules becomes a basic feature of the game around which the actual interrelationships of its participants are focused. As a result, the regulation of behavior, in accordance with the social norms and models
that are contained in role relationships, merges with behavior
regulation under the influence of peers in real relationships.
Interaction of these factors leads to development of the mechanisms for .the volitional control of behavior and to the subordination of situational motivation to more significant motives, laying
the foundation for the development of a continuous hierarchy of
motives, which makes it possible to detect a certain directionality in the childs personality. The content of this directionality and the structure of the forming personality are determined by the entire system of upbringing and the childs interactions with adults and peers.
In the preschool setting, group play exerts a decisive influence on the character of the first social organization of children, which forms in the kindergarten group and can be called
a childrens society (A. P. Usova). As special studies have
shown, these groups are very complex formations with a clearly
defined microstructure, unique value orientations, and shared
opinion. Since the group forms and is primarily realized in
joint play, adults may influence its structure and value orientations through the organization and supervision of play. In turn,

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SOVIET EDUCATION

the place a child occupies in the group and the groups opinion
exert a very powerful influence on the formation of the childs
personality. Behavioral stereotypes form in the group, and the
child has the opportunity to compare his actions and qualities
with those of his peers. The child develops his ability of selfappraisal and new elements of self-awareness. He develops an
understanding of his identity, the qualities that he possesses,
how those around him relate to him, and the reasons underlying
their attitudes.
The so-called productive types of activity, the simplest types
of labor and study, art activity, etc., form in close relationship
with the childs play. The figurative character of these preschool activities, the high degree of their emotionality, and the
creative elements introduced by the child into his depiction of
the world make them akin to play. Development of this type of
activity takes the direction of mastering the creation and embodiment of a design that is directed toward obtaining a real
product which will be positively evaluated by adults and peers.
Productive activities make higher demands than play on the
childs perception and promote the development of the latter.
Like play, they influence development of the signal function in
the childs consciousness, his figurative thought and imagination,
and improve the volitional regulation of actions which under
these conditions are determined by an image of the desired product.
4. Age-related Features of the Mental
Development of Children in Determining
the Tasks of Education
All the foregoing determines Soviet psychologys approach to
the problem of the age-related features of the childs mental
development and their consideration in the process of upbringing and education.
Age-related psychological characteristics are concretely historical and are determined by the childs position in society and
by the upbringing and education system. Two basic consequences

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a5

result from this. First, age-related features must be viewed

in connection with concrete conditions of child development.
They can only be elicited with regard to children who develop under relatively similar conditions (i.e., within the framework of a certain culture, at a certain point of the historical development of society). Second, we should understand age-related features to mean not so much the mental traits that a child
possesses at a given stage of development as the traits that can
and should be developed in him.
Recognition of the leading role of upbringing and education in
mental development does not alter the fact that at every age
level upbringing must take into account the attained level of development, and especially the qualitative uniqueness, of mental
properties and abilities that is characteristic for that stage and
that is determined by the whole complex of the conditions of
child development in modern society. It is necessary to consider this point but not to lower ones goals because of it; starting at this point, one leads the child further in his development .
The key to understanding the basic tasks of upbringing at the
early age levels is provided by the points we have examined regarding the general conditions created by society for child development and the forms of social contact and activity corresponding to these conditions.
The distinguishing feature of the organization of the life of
the child from birth until entrance to school is the lack of serious obligations to society and the associated absence of strict
regulation of the childs activity by adults. Activity itself, in
its typical forms, is nonspecific in nature. It is not broken down
in accordance with the types of labor known to man or within
areas of knowledge, although it is through activity that the abilities are shaped which a child needs later to make the transition to the activity of school work and, subsequently, to labor
activity in school. This applies not only to social contact with
adults and to activity involving objects and play, but also to
drawing, design, and other types of productive activity that appear to be directly related to certain types of adult activity,

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since the child variants are very remote from complex

adult forms. All types of childrens activity contain a very
broad spectrum of problems of general human significance
that relate, in principle, to any area of life and human labor.
These are the tasks of social contact (in particular, verbal contact) and of establishing interaction with other people, the use
of household items and the simplest tools, the planning of actions and implementation of ideas, the subordination of behavior to a model or rule, and the resolution of difficult situations that arise in joint activity. A distinguishing feature of
child-type activities is the continuous penetration of them by
conditions that are new to the child. New conditions do not require a simple reproduction of experience but a creative approach, not in the sense, of course, of the creation of socially
valuable products but in a subjective sense.
The dominance of such types of activity in early and preschool childhood suggests that what is decisive at this age is
the formation of the more general mental properties and abilities that are needed by every member of human society. Specialized knowledge, skills, and abilities, although they be learnec
by [preschool-age] children, are not a particular attainment of
this age group and do not correspond with the basic significance
of the place that has been assigned to the preschool period in the
course of social development.
This means that the preschool curriculum must, above all,
bear in mind general developmental goals and that the logic underlying the construction of this curriculum must proceed not
from the logic of compartmentalized, academic knowledge [in
the school subject disciplines] or from the conventional didactic principles [underlying the graded school curriculum] but
from the formation of the most generally significant mental
properties and abilities.
In infancy and early childhood, the tasks of upbringing examined from this point of view are relatively uniform. They reduce to the formation of those qualities that are the most genera;
prerequisites to further development of all the specifically human mental properties and abilities (the need for social contact,

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direct address [priamokhozhdenie], speech, the use of objects,

basic forms of perception and thought, the separation of the self
from others). These attributes will not determine the personal
characteristics of the future individual; they are almost neutrally
related to individual lines of development. All of them are subject to further reworking; the young child does not yet possess
a structured inner world.
In preschool childhood, articulation of the tasks of upbringing
becomes substantially more complicated. This is the period of
the actual formation of the personality (A. N. Leontev), of
permanent [personality trait] acquisitions. The mental properties and abilities form that belong to the structure of the childs
personality, determining, to a greater or lesser degree, the entire
path of further development. What is more, preschool childhood
leads directly into school. It is a period of preparation, and the
tasks of preschooling must be examined from the standpoint of
the demands that school makes on the child.
Thus, determination of the tasks of preschool upbringing requires that its long-range significance be compared with its
significance in preparing the child for the immediate future.
When we speak of the enduring significance of preschool age
in forming the human personality, we must, first and foremost,
emphasize that, owing to the forming of hierarchically arranged
motivations, the basic type of personality orientation and the
relative weight of various motivations within their hierarchical
structure is determined. The interests of the communist education of the younger generation dictate the necessity of imbuing
children with a social orientation from the very beginning, in
contrast to a narrowly personal, selfish orientation. Of course,
the hierarchy of motivations forming in preschool childhood
should not be considered final and unchangeable. If the motivational hierarchy forms adversely, subsequently, reeducation of
the individual will be necessary, rather than normal, positive
development.
In addition to the formation of the individuals personality
orientation in preschool childhood, certain types of social contact take shape, relations with other people form, and stereo-

..

88

SOVIET EDUCATION

tYP@s Of social behavior develop. In accordance with the goals

of communist upbringing, we must make maximum use of the

Potential for developing in each child communal qualities

(A. P. Usova) - forms Of social contact and behavior within a
collective that ensure cooperation and mutual help, creating the
foundations of collectivism.
All this determines the direction of preschool upbringing as
education focused on the task of laying the foundations of moralitY, instilling children with the morals that conform to the go&
of our society and with the behavioral norms derived from them
The contribution made by the preschool period to the mental
development of the child consists of rapid development of the
figurative forms of cognitive activity - perception, figurative
thought, and imagination.
The conditions that coalesce for such development in this
period are unique because logical thought becomes predomi
in emphasis during the school years. In adult perception, figurative thought and imagination are the basis for the minds
regulation of many types of labor, and they are linked closely
to creativity in the realm of art and science.
L. S. Vygotsky pointed out the phenomenon of age-related
sensibility - the particular sensitivity of children, at every
Stage Of development, to the types of instruction that are designed to form particular mental processes and qualities. Numerous experiments in recent decades have shown that preschoolers are particularly sensitive to those educational influences which are addressed to figurative forms of cognition an
lead to the development of these forms.
But all the mental properties and abilities noted - the hierarchical subordination of motivations, the arbitrary nature of
behavior, and the figurative forms of cognition - are formed
in types of activity germane to childhood (play, drawing, building and making things, etc.) and are the product of their development. Accordingly, the basic way to exert a pedagogical influence on the preschooler is the comprehensive stimulation
and enrichment of these types of activity and the application of
optimal methods to organize and direct them. This mode is

89

widely used by Soviet preschool pedagogy.

Simultaneously, one of the important attainments of preschool education in our country, and in other countries of the
socialist community, is the introduction of the systematic instruction of children in learning activities, although these differ
substantially from school lessons. First, their content is made
up significantly of instruction in object-oriented, play-related,
and productive activities. Second, the methods used in those
activities that introduce preschool pupils to phenomena in the
world of nature and in social life, the development of speech,
etc., are based on the use of elements of play and productive
assignments. And, third, learning activities are combined
closely with independent activities; the latter are enriched with
the necessary knowledge and ability required to play games,
draw, make things, etc.
Can preschool education be coordinated with the task of preparing children for the school period of development that, from
many points of view, is a kind of antipode to preschool education? The school changes the childs place in the System Of SOcial relationships and demands that he assume a responsible attitude toward schoolwork as a serious social duty; a high level
of the conscious regulation of behavior is demanded, in cognitive activity and the development of logical thought. If we understand preparation for school to mean the timely inculcation
of preschoolers with all the qualities that pupils must POssess,
then a shift downward into the preschool of particular schoolrelated forms of education is required because the living Con&ions and activities that are characteristic Of the preschool
do not require such qualities and, consequently, in themselves
cannot lead to their formation. Given such an approach, the
task of preparing children for school inevitably clashes with
the tasks of preschool education.
However, another approach is possible. The preschool experience should prepare children psychologically for school,
creating prerequisites for the subsequent development of those
new qualities that emerge in the process of education itself under the new conditions.

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90

SOVIET EDUCATIC

Play is a free type of activity; participation is determined

only by the childs desire. However, formation of the mechanisms underlying volitional behavior control and the subordin
tion of behavior to a system of rules create prerequisites for
the subsequent inclusion of the child in obligatory, socially si
nificant activity. Figurative thought, which forms in play and
in productive types of activity, not only possesses independen
value but also leads the child to the threshold of logic, to the
similation of generalized and systematized knowledge. Research in recent years has demonstrated the illegitimacy of
the view that the assimilation of logical forms of thought requires overcoming its figurative forms. In actuality, within
the framework of figurative thought, the child masters the ab!
ity to reason consistently and begins to depict very general rl
lationships and regularities in phenomena. The assimilation
concepts and intellectual actions of a logical type does not oc.
cur in a struggle with figurative thought but rather on the b
sis of its highest, generalized forms.
The orientation of preschool education toward formation of
the most generally significant mental properties and abilities
of the child and the maximum use of types of activities which
are specific to the preschooler do not preclude the introductic
of preschoolers to certain types of special teaching that enab!
children to master organized systems of knowledge and skill
An initial teaching of reading and writing and instruction in el
mentary mathematics have become traditional sections of the
preschool curriculum, and the information conveyed to the ch
dren about animate and inanimate nature and social life is be
coming increasingly scientific and systematic. However, the
principal task remains, that of securing the general developmental effect of teaching and forming on that basis those men
tal properties and abilities that correspond to the specific fea
tures of preschool childhood.

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